Today I want to talk about my obsession with receiving blankets. I’ve talked about receiving blankets and cloth diapering before but never dedicated an entire post to the topic. Receiving blankets continue to be one of my most frequently googled terms that bring users to my site. #funfact.

Hey Guys, so that you know this post does contain affiliate links. Purchases made at those links may result in me receiving a commission. The FTC wants you to know to this, and that’s okay because I’m just another mom trying to hustle her life on the internet.

What’s the Deal with Receiving Blankets?

Receiving blankets is one of the cheapest, most affordable, absorbent material you could use for cloth diapering and these two reasons, plus more is why I am smitten about Receiving Blankets. Microfibre might be cheap, but it is not awesome, I’d rather touch a spider than touch microfibre. Flour Sack Towels are also cheap, but find out why I don’t like those here.

Cheap & Affordable.

Reliable Absorbency.

Simple, Straightforward, No stink washing.

Easy to Use.

Multipurpose

Why not buy new?

New receiving blankets are not affordable. Seriously. A new package will cost you 15+ dollars, and work out to like $8/each. At that price, you might as well buy a SmartFold or GroVia Prefold diaper or a HumBird Flat. [okay, those are not fair comparisons but hey]

Buying them used is super easy, get onto your local buy and sell (BST) group and look. Usually, parents sell them for $1-2 a piece. You can also find them at second-hand shops for similar prices. For $1-2 a piece, you can barely buy microfibre for that cost.

When you buy them used, you’re also reusing them a product and potential diverting them from our waste streams. From an environmental stance, this is a win for me because sometimes things need a second chance in life before they hit the can.

Always Absorbent & More

After a time, microfibre begins to wear out because as a plastic based product it sheds while being washed. Natural fibres begin to disintegrate too (that’s why you get holey products), but their life expectancy seems to be much longer and complaints of reduced absorbency much fewer.

Not only are we talking time, but a large Carters receiving blanket will hold upwards o 12-14 oz of absorbency. That’s like two microfibre pads and fewer COMPRESSION LEAKS. (That’s what happens when something heavy sits on a wet spongey absorbency). I also believe this is significantly trimmer, even when padfolded because it’s less fluffy.

Easy Washing

If you’re stressed out about washing cloth diapers, flat cloth diapers are the answer for you. This love of receiving blankets also applies to any flat cloth diaper. Because it’s just one layer of material, there’s nothing complicated about washing, and it’s less likely to hold the stink because of their’s no layers for stinky things to get trapped in.

That’s why we use them for the Flats and Handwashing challenge because it’s just easy. My receiving blankets have yet to stink, unlike my fitted diapers, my AIO, or any of my other absorbent materials.

Fold & Go

You’re probably thinking but now Bailey, I have to fold diapers. Well, yea, but it takes like less than thirty seconds. I find folding receiving blankets super straightforward, and no different than folding any other basket of laundry. I lay mine on top of pockets in a padfold because in my opinion stuffing a diaper takes too much time.

Multipurpose

Have you ever been somewhere and thought fudge I should have brought XYorZ? Well, there’s a good chance a Receiving blanket can solve those problems. Clean up a big mess, act as impromptu nursing cover, maybe a little blanket to sit on? Or a sunshade for the stroller? A receiving blanket in your bag offers a plethora of options should you need it for something else.

A few other things I like about receiving blankets – The pretty colours they come in. The connect with snappis and Boingo’s without a problem.

I exclusively cloth diaper my toddler with recieving blankets. Sometimes we use a GroVia Size 3 prefold, but really there isn’t anything out there I like any better. He’s a big kid, and he’s outsized my traditional sized prefolds, so these are quick and affordable. Creating this stash cost me $15. I would pay that for 1.5 prefold cloth diapers his size. My littles

Some things I don’t’ like – how big they can be for smaller babies. I’m not supporting a locally owned or manufactured product.

I mostly use receiving blankets for my flat diaper stash. They are large, absorbent and awesome. However, I recently got my hands on some beautiful work-at-home-mom flat cloth diapers. These flat cloth diapers are ideal for smaller babies as they fold up to the perfect padfold size and into the perfect kite fold. But, I still wanted to try them with my toddler! So, whats a mom to do? She’s going to padfold flat cloth diapers a little differently!

Typical Padfold

My typical padfold style is to fold the diaper in half. Then fold it in half again. Now you have a quarter of the flat. I then roll it into thirds and call it a day.

As you can see, with the HumBird Stretchy Hemp Flat Diapers this was too small (and honestly a little bulky) for my toddler. The small padfold would have just moved around, squished, and wrinkled inside the cover.

I really wanted to use the HumBird Stretchy Flat Diaper with him because they were already proving to be AMAZING with Little Miss. Time for some creativity in folding. The nice thing about using Flat Diapers is there is no right or wrong way to do things. As a lover of flat diaper, you have free reign to be creative and fold the flat diaper to your heart’s content. Don’t get caught up that there’s the only way to fold things.

How to pad fold a Small Flat for a Toddler

Lay out your flat.

Fold in the corners.

Fold in Half or Thirds.

Lay in Diaper, and snap on!

DONE!

Seriously, it is that simple. This strategy gives me the same awesome flat in a much trimmer and BETTER fitting absorbency for my 30lb+ toddler. Meanwhile, I still much prefer the kite fold for my 17lb baby.

When I gave up my AIO cloth diapers for simplicity some months ago, I opted to embrace Flat Cloth Diapers and Prefold Cloth Diapers. And while I typically, padfold my cloth diapers, there is a time and place for a folded cloth diapers. One of my favourite folds for littlest is the Kite Fold.

This fold evenly distributes the bulk of the diaper towards the centre without being TOO bulky. It’s fairly simple to remember and use. Depending on the size of your flat diaper, the completed fold will change. However, the size is easily adjusted based on how far up you fold the top or bottom of the diaper.

Using my HumBird flats I got the perfect size for Little Miss. However, these particular flats were too small for Little Man. Typically, I use a large receiving blanket with him and it’s just perfect size.

Kite Fold for Flat Diapers

Note: Steps 2 & 3 are interchangeable. I prefer to do it this way as it gives fewer folds for poop mix up.

Lay Out Flat, and fold sides to create a “kite shape.”

Fold up the long skinny bottom. Depending on how far you fold this up changes the overall rise of this diaper. If you fold it less for more bigger babies and more for smaller babies (or try a mini kite fold)

Fold down the Top triangle.

Roll in the sides of the diaper. I find it helpful to roll up the sides before folding onto baby, but it can also be done when folding onto baby

Fold onto Baby and secure with either a diaper pin, boingo, or snapppi.

This diaper fold is EVER SO SWEET on Little Miss in her HumBird Flat Diapers. Check out my review later this week. In the meanwhile admire her cuteness below with a Kite Fold Flat Diaper.

Basically anything can be a cloth diaper. If it’s made of absorbent material and can be somehow adhered to the body then you are good to go. The object of diapering is to keep pants dry, absorb urine, and contain poop. With such minimal standards for cloth diapering, it’s easy enough to find an every day object for an IKEA cloth diaper.

There are lots of different options for cotton clothes at IKEA. I’m sure many of these would work, but if you choose the right one, you’ll get the best results. Next time your shopping for your IKEA cloth diaper, take a look out for the Himmelsk Burp Cloth I’m not sure where you find them, because I randomly found a package near the exit of IKEA (and thus remembered why I was there in the first place). The Himmelsk collection is part of the Children’s IKEA. You’ll even notice on the IKEA link, these are advertised as suitable for diapering. :O

Why the Himmelsk Burp Cloth for an IKEA Cloth Diaper?

Why these clothes? Why not any other kitchen towel or bed sheet? Because the Himmelsk Burp clothes are an ideal shape for folding on flats. If you prefer to pad fold, I’m sure you could use just about anything 100% cotton. However, the Himmelsk Burp Cloth is an ideal shape for folding onto babies and toddlers. It waffles up in the dryer, and creates a nice soft, textured surface for diapering.

The Himmelsk is not too thick or thin. It’s not too large or small. It’s just right. It’s everything you want and more. It grasps onto Boingo’s and Snappi’s, as well as suitable for pins. Pad fold or do something fancy, and it does the diapering job.

Compared to a Flour Sack Towel from Wal-Mart, the Himmelsk Burp Cloth is slightly larger, much fluffier (but I didn’t find this fluff translated when on-the-bum), and more absorbent. It’s also pricier and harder to get your hands on.

At $6.99 for a two pack these cotton squares work out to $3.50/each. My kitchen absorbency testing suggests they hold between 9-11 ounces of liquid, and my real life use lasted a short nap for my little Miss. They also wash up great and dry overnight. These bad boys don’t wrinkle and fall out shape like FST.

They shrink just a little in the wash and dryer, but hold their shape great. The shrunken one has been washed and dried for several weeks now.

I definitely enjoy using the Himmelsk Burp Cloth as my IKEA cloth diaper hack, and would continue to do so. If you had an IKEA near you, then I would DEFINITELY recommend these over FST towels or receiving blankets. My biggest peeve with receiving blankets is the variation in sizing and how big they can be on little babies (and if you can’t buy them used, they can be expensive new).

What everyday object to you use in a creative way? Have you ever thought “hey, I could use this as a diaper?”

9 Lessons from the Flats & Hand washing Challenge

1. I actually do have the time. As a busy stay-at-home-mom, I was thoroughly surprised I had the time. It meant watching a little less television, and spending a little less time on social media. Neither of which is a bad thing, but rather enriched my life.

2. I hate flour sack towels and love t-shirt diapers. I might actually use t-shirt diapers again as they were a killer overnight solution for my toddler. However, I’ll shut up about FST as an economical viable alternative to microfibre or fancy inserts.

3. Less is More. This concept applies not only to detergent, but also to everything. This challenge I really learnt less things is easier.

Cloth Diaper Covers: Except for the days when my kids pooped all freaking day, I didn’t really need a dozen covers. We could easily rotate 2-3 covers in one day per kid.

Quality flats instead of FST would also save me in fewer flats to wash (because frequent and double layered diaper changes to accommodate the poor absorbency). Perhaps a stash of 10 receiving blankets instead of 15 FST for Little Miss.

And then there’s the rest of my laundry… There are other areas of my life where I could scale back and do laundry a little less – wear pants a couple more times, use a towel a third time, reuse a sleeper the next night, etcetera.

4. It’s not all or nothing. I know the Flats & Hand Washing Challenge has rules, but that’s because it’s a challenge.But, there’s real world and its okay if shit hits the fan and you can’t anymore. This moment that I tell you, I used 3 disposable diapers during the week and that’s because I was struggling to mom. Don’t think I don’t know that being able to do that comes with privilege, but I needed to for me. It’s okay if you needed to do something for you because that’s real life.

5. I have zero strength or endurance in my forearms and wrists. Day 5 was crash and burn day, and I just couldn’t wring diapers anymore. I tried using a colander, but opted to squeeze and let the sun do the rest.
6. I’m not a vlogger. I tried to film my diaper wash routine, but TWICE I failed to record it. The first time I lost the file on upload, the second time I forgot to turn on the camera. I didn’t try a third time because I’m busy. I might not be a great vlogger, but YouTube Sensation Jessica DeGraff nailed it every time.
7. Humbling. I always finish the Flats & Hand Washing Challenge feeling very humbled. Especially after reading about others experiences and some of the very real struggles many families face to diaper their children. THANK YOU to everyone who shares their stories of struggle, of realization and their eye opening moments.8. I’m reminded to involve my children more. Diaper laundry sucks, and really I’m the only who can efficiently agitate diapers. But during this week, my little toddler wanted to help and be involved. Its fun to have them ‘help’ and its okay if they make a mess. Involving them, and showing them value in physical tasks is incredibly beneficial and worth the delay, the extra mess, and more.9. I need to do more things I don’t like. I don’t like hand-washing diapers. I don’t like folding flat diapers. I don’t like painting. I don’t like picking up dog poop. There are a lot of things I don’t like to do. I really just need to things I don’t like to do. It’ll make me appreciate the things I do like to do better.

That’s my list of somewhat serious and non-serious things I learnt this year during the Flats & Hand Washing Challenge. These 9 Lessons from the Flats & Hand washing Challenge have made an impact on my life this week, and I hope you learnt something.

Last Thoughts

I have zero regrets about participating in the Flats & Hand Washing Challenge. I find it very rewarding and worthwhile. Is it totally ridiculous? Yes, but a little crazy just makes life a little more fun.

For next year, I want to remember the following. 1) No FST. 2) Fewer Covers – Hide your others. 3) Get a proper drying rack for outside! 4) Figure out the lid for your bucket to keep from splashing yourself. 5) You got this.

Will you be joining me next year for the Flats & Hand Washing Challenge? How do you support causes you care about?

Finally – One last shameless plug to go be a fan on Facebook! Because tomorrow I’ve got a wet bag to giveaway for hitting 500 fans! For a chance to win, go check me out (and turn on notifications, so you don’t miss it!)

DISCLAIMER: Writing this post doesn’t hurt small business and is a reflection of my true and honest experience. This post is directly in relation with Flour Sack Towels I purchased at Walmart Canada. You may have purchased other Four Sack Towels elsewhere that represent a better quality product. Feel free to share with me YOUR experience in the comments.I understand cloth diapering is a subjective experience that varies drastically between families and children.

During the past week of using my flat diaper stash and hand washing, I’ve learned the incredible value of a quality absorbent flat diaper. Not all flats are created equal, and not all flat diaper materials are worthwhile. And for us, the Flour Sack Towel was a giant waste of my time.

I don’t consider Little Miss to be a heavy wetter, but rather a moderate wetter based on her liquid diet of breast milk. An average one-size AIO is sufficient (unlike newborn) for a 2-hour period. The flour sack towels I’m using in her diapers were like mere tissues. She quickly soaked them in an hour, and two were drenched before we hit hour two.

I feel like for the past week, I am in a constant never ending state of diaper changes with her. And like any small child, she doesn’t like sitting in a wet diaper. So, when one or two gets quickly drenched, I have a small angry child on my hands. And that is far from a pleasant experience. The more diapers I change, the more diapers I have to wash. The more diapers I have to wash, the more tired my body gets.

Say No to Flour Sack Towel for Diapers

1. Not Enough Absorbency: Unless I used two flour sack towels for diapers, she had to be changed within an hour. The FST was max saturated and at risk of leakage.

It’s just not worth it, and while they may be thin, two together is fiddle some and fluffy. And just a pain in my time.

2. Overall Cost Comparison: $6.94 gets you 5 Flour Sack Towels for diapers at Walmart Canada. This works out to $1.38 per FST; but I needed two to last two hours and thus costing me $2.76 per diaper change. For $2.69, I could buy an Osocozy Unbleached Cotton Flat from LagoonBaby (Canada) . Just slightly cheaper, but one flat diaper is less of a nuisance to fold, and slightly less bulky overall. AND IS ONE FEWER DIAPER… actually thats like 7 fewer diapers at the end of the day. Thats almost an ENTIRE load of laundry.

3. Forget about birth-toddlerhood: I really think any diapering product you choose should be an investment that CAN last from birth to potty training. Flour Sack Towels for diapers fit little newborns GREAT, but they just aren’t long lasting to meet the needs of growing baby, and forget about trying them on a full bladdered toddler.

Unless you have a magical fairy light wetting toddler, FST just will not grow with your child and you’ll need to replace them. So why not buy something else first?

4. Better Options: There are better options for diapering a child than using Flour Sack Towels. These options are more absorbent and absorbency is key. Check out my list below.

5. Warped Shape: After a week of washing and drying, my FST are a funny shape. This is minuscule, but it drives me batty. I also hate how my edges all curl after line drying.

Dislike: I find my t-shirt diapers do not wash up in my hand wash routine as nicely as the other flat diapers. This is especially true for uncut t-shirts. They also take forever to dry. Furthermore, the T-shirt diaper requires creative folding to shrink down for Little Miss. (But you can do it, and perhaps you have 100% cotton kids t-shirts ready for recycling, those would be great for a newborn.

Like: T-shirt diapers are dirt cheap, and T-shirt diapers are a great overnight cloth diaper for my toddler.

3. Flat Diapers: There are commercially available brands of flat diapers on the market. I love that when you purchase these products you are supporting a small or locally owned business. I love that there is a standard size and expectation that comes from flat diapers. Here’s some brands to check out -Have a favourite flat diaper? Let me know in the comments.

Final Thoughts on Flour Sack Towels

When you say no to flour sack towels for diapers, you are saying yes I want a better cloth diaper experience.

Opt to reuse receiving blankets or t-shirts for diapers and you are finding another way to reduce, reuse and recycle. This keeps things from our landfills, and gives products a second life.

Opt to purchase new flats, and you are saying yes to small business. Cloth diaper retailers provide boosts to our local economy. They purchase products from other small brands and manufacturers, and they just make good shopping sense.

Just say no to flour sack towels for diapers, and say yes to something better.

For the latest and greatest follow our Flats & Hand washing Challenge on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. For sure follow us on Instagram, then you can catch flats in action with #flatschallenge.

If you used flour sack towels, what was your experience? When and how would you recommend them.

If you haven’t used them, how do you support small business? Or reduce your ecological footprint?

I don’t have a specific topic to talk about today for the Flats Challenge. It’s open topic, and I’ve been really busy promoting some great giveaways here on the blog and Facebook. I’m working hard on getting this blog established, and learning about Pinterest, Twitter, and Instagram. With 2 babies its hard to keep it all together. My goal for June is master the art of Pinterest – whatever that means.

Back to the important stuff – Flat Diapers and Babies

I have a TON of pictures of my kids in flat diapers. Because I don’t have a topic today, I’m going to just show you how cute my babies are! And, if you have a question you want answered, leave me a comment below. I’ll try to answer it for you!

Came home to the wind having blown all my flats over the deck.

Little Miss rocking a made up fold for her night time diaper. This is a Flour Sack Towel with a Receiving Blanket and a Snappi.

And then I’m taking a holiday from cloth diapering. I’m not actually looking forward to it. Last time I took a break, we had poop explosions down our pants and it was not enjoyable. However, as much as I usually travel with cloth diapers, I don’t want to do it with TWO BABIES by myself. I kind of want a break, and one less thing to worry about.

I have couple diapers to review and post about during this time. While cloth diapers won’t be on the bum, they will be on our minds! Maybe, I’ll think about telling you how much I loved using GroVia BioSoakers on my last cloth diaper-free holiday?

I don’t believe washing diapers is a science. I don’t believe there is one right way to do things, nor do I play by hard and fast rules.

Despite participating in the 2016 Flats and Hand washing challenge, I kind of forgot everything I knew about hand washing diapers. Lucky for me, its just laundry with the basic goal of “gets it clean.” I’ve seen enough TV and documentaries to get the general gist of what a hand wash routine might look like – you need agitation, water, and some sort of soap/detergent. Scrub till clean, rinse, ring out, dry and repeat.

Rock Your Hand Wash Routine

I’m not going to go into the specifics on how I wash my diapers. If you really want to know follow me on Facebook, I might get a chance to load my morning wash routine via video. Every time is a little different, instead here’s my top tips on how to rock your very own hand wash routine! This year, I’m using a bucket and plunger style system, sometimes known as a camp style washer. These tips are applicable no matter how you do it.

Open dirty diapers: When placing your diapers in your washing vesicle, unravel the fold to make cleaning and agitating easier.

Wear Gloves: Not because diapers are dirty, but because using detergent or soap is hard on your hands. Your hands will love you. Protip: keep some moisturizer nearby.

Drill Holes in Plunger: Seriously, this is amazing. It was so much easier to agitate and plunge my diapers after we did!

Less is more: the more detergent you use, the more you have to rinse out of the diapers. Rinsing diapers is the most menial and not fun task. Start with less, and add more if you need it. You can always add more detergent to your hand wash routine, but taking away the detergent is more time consuming and daunting.

It’s not Science: its just laundry, and you really can’t screw it up. If your flat diapers smell a little funky after drying, tweak things the next time. Maybe more detergent, or agitation. Just keep at it. Honestly, my diapers smell a little funky right now and I’m going to use them and wash them better next time. Don’t stress about it, go with you gut, and just keep it simple.

Bonus: How to Hand Wash Diapers with 2 kids under 2.

1) Get them to Help! My toddler isn’t the best diaper plunger/agitator, but he loves to help. And letting him help me “agitate” diapers is the highlight of his moment. Once he got bored, I got back to real work. Pro tip: best time to get them to help is when you’re doing your final rinse cycles; less likely to be covered in poop/pee water and need a bath. (but hey, bath time is also fun!)

No, I haven’t tandem babies while hand washing (YET), but I could if I needed too.

3) TV Distraction. Paw Patrol let me get the diapers clean yesterday. I’ll admit to using TV to get things done, but don’t worry this Hike it Baby family gets its fair share of outside play time.

4) Help. My partner has been home this week, and has been able to wrangle a child or two to help me wash, wring and dry diapers.
Nap Time: I don’t really like doing chores during nap time because its my time to work on this blog, and get some downtime. However, for you, it might be best time.

Have you ever hand washed diapers or clothing? What did you learn from the experience?

When it comes to flats, I’m usually #teampadfold. I love a simple, easy-to-use, pad folded flat (or even prefold diaper). You make it up as you fold, and end up with a nice neat pile of diapers ready to be matched up with your favourite cloth diaper cover.

But, then there are little babies, and for me, little babies are better suited to a folded on flat. Why?

A) Folding on a flat reduces bulk. Larger, thicker, flat diapers (like receiving blankets in my toddler stash) tend to be bulky when pad folded to the right size compared to a folded on flat diaper.

B) Folding on a flat diaper also helps contain the poop. Newborn babies, especially breastfed babies, have nice liquidity golden poops and a folded on diaper gives an extra barrier.

My Favourite Fold: Happy Anteater Fold.

It’s easier to watch a video, or check out my photos. If I was to verbally describe the Happy Anteater fold…

Start with a large SQUARE flat (If its a rectangle, make it a square).

Fold it in half, and then half again.

Grab a single corner of the flat (where all the edges meet) and drag it out and across to form a triangle.

Flip it over, so the triangle is now on the floor/table/lap.

Roll/Fold up the remaining square into the middle of the diaper.

Fold the triangle arms up next to the centre of the flat to form ‘ears.’

Fold them once more, or roll them when on baby.

Lay baby onto the middle of the flat.

Fold the middle up.

Roll up the edges.

Bring the ‘ear’s’ across to secure with a Boingo or Snappi.

5 Reasons to LOVE the Happy Anteater Fold

1) I can do the Happy Anteater fold on my lap without too much difficulty. It doesn’t require empty floor space or table to fold.

2) I can easily unfold a pad folded diaper to a Happy Anteater Fold. I pad fold my diapers by folding in half, and half again. This is essential the beginning steps of the Happy Anteater Fold.

3) I’m less likely to experience flat diaper shorts (as indicated in the video).
4) Majority of the absorbency is in the center of the Happy Anteater fold giving a trim tush, and absorbency where I want it.

5) It’s easy to boost. Roll or Fold in your favourite booster and its good to go. (NEW STASH ADDITION: I’ve been boosting my FST with a GroVia Wipe)

We’ve been boosting this fold because a FST (Flour Sack Towel) is not enough absorbency for Little Miss. I either add an additional GroVia wipe in the middle of the diaper (I boosted all of my newborn aio cloth diapers with them) or use two FST together and fold as one. I fold the two together, rather than adding it the centre of the diaper to spread out some of the bulk.

Current Laundry situation.

What is your favourite flat fold? Are you team pad fold? Or do you have a love of folding diapers?

Don’t worry; much like the rest of the laundry in my house, my freshly washed flats are currently in a pile on the couch.

This post contains affiliate links. Purchases from this links incurs no cost to you and lets me keep on blogging and trying out new products.
I’m participating in the 2017 Flats and Handwashing Challenge hosted by Cloth Diaper Revival. This event focuses on the very real and viable answer to cloth diaper your children.

There’s no right way to build a flat diaper stash. Your flat diaper stash can be anything. If you’ve been hopping around the other Flats and Hand washing blogs and social media accounts this week (don’t forget to check out #flatschallenge on Instagram), you’ll notice our flat diaper stashes all look different. For some families it’s about the ultimate budget stash – how cheap can you go? For other families, its about using what you already have or trying out new products.

While I love to #tryallthediapers, I tried to restrain myself this week because I can try a new flat diaper anytime of the year, but this week I challenge myself to build a reasonably economical cloth flat diaper stash. My challenge to myself is to use low-cost products or re-use other household items for this challenge. This jives best with my personal goals and ambitions for the challenge.

For my toddler, I opted to do a $100 flat diaper stash. His flat diaper stash consists of 5 covers I purchased second hand (and new) for about $75/80 (Sorry, Canadian costs drag) along with receiving blankets and t-shirt diapers. Throw in a couple diaper pins, and we are good to go.

Flat Diaper Stash for Little Miss

As for my youngest, I took a different approach to her flat diaper stash. She’s only 3 months new, but she’s already a chunk. We’ve outgrown most of our newborn cloth diaper covers, so we’ll be taking advantage of smaller fitting one-size covers and our Blueberry Newborn Capri. We will trying out Flour Sack Towels because these are frequently touted as a reasonable economical alternative to microfibre. So far, I’m less than impressed with absorbency, but we will keep working on it.

Yes, you can totally do it cheaper! The second hand market is amazing place to buy covers for $10-15 or less! The covers I choose for this challenge I purchased mostly new, but I just love them so much. I choose to use what I had rather than scavenge for cheaper cloth diaper covers. My Best Bottom fits her awesome, and the GroVia shells are a favourite.

What about those Flip Daytimes? I really wanted to keep my stash economically reasonable. Retailing at $10.75 CDN at CozyBum Diapers, they aren’t very budget-friendly. But I needed something with better absorbency than a FST and might work for nighttime. I picked a couple off the BST last year for cheap, and then bought one new (that’s why they only cost me $15).

Other Related Materials

Cloth Wipes – Simply Dad is less than impressed, but our flannel cloth wipes save us a ton of money on disposable wipes. I used $5/meter flannel and sewed a double-sided wipe. ($5-10)

On the Go Wetbags – A wet bag for out and about is awesome to have. I have a few DIY ones, and recently won a GroVia Zippered wet bag. It’s amazing and I love everything about it. ($20)

5 Gallon Bucket for Washing – We’ve opted to use a bucket for washing this year. I picked this one up at Lowe’s for $5.

Plunger – We finally found a reasonable plunger at Superstore for $10. (I have this one on Amazon, it was cheaper at the store!)

Gloves – a must for keeping hands nice and dry. I had a pair under the sink.

Detergent – I’ll use what I have on hand.

Last year, I also used a hanging wet bag, but not this year. I’m opting to keep dirty diapers in my wash bin. I hope this gives me a better visual of when I need to do diapers. Follow our Flats & Hand washing Challenge on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

What is the most creative way you’ve diapered a baby? Do you have a favourite flat diaper brand?

Did you know Bummis released a new and improved version of their AIO cloth diaper? No? At the end of the November, Bummis released the Pure making a series of significant changes to their already pretty awesome all in one cloth diaper. Check out my review of the previous version here. Disclosure: Kerri from Cozybums dropped one of […]